John Chapter 12:1-6

Worship is an important part of the believer's life. That's why on Sunday morning, we spend time in worship. We want to linger in worship.

We want to take some time, 20 minutes, 25 minutes, sometimes 30 minutes to linger in worship. You know why? Because that is important.

That is important. And when somebody, when an unbeliever, or maybe somebody that strayed from the Lord comes into a group of people that are really worshiping, oh, man, there ain't nothing like that in the whole world. Welcome to Cross the Bridge with David McGee. David is the senior pastor of The Bridge in Kernersville, North Carolina. Today we have with us one of David McGee's associate pastors, D.A.

Brown. Welcome, brother. Hey, Bob. It's great to be here. One of the things that David McGee talks about during this next program is how does a Christian life start and what about fellowship with other believers?

Can you give us some insights on that? Bob, in our life with Jesus, worship is an expression of things. We don't worship because we feel like it. We do it because God is worthy of our worship. Today, Pastor David explains worship as he continues in the Gospel of John, chapter 12. That's gonna be great, hearing how worship ties in with other aspects of the Christian life.

So here's David McGee with his teaching, A Giving God. So, John, chapter 12, and we're now, we're coming into the last days of the life of Jesus. John does something interesting and, well, actually, all the Gospels do something interesting. The Gospels contain 89 chapters altogether, all four of them, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

And there's only four of them. There's no lost Gospels or anything like that. So there's 89 chapters altogether, so there's 89 chapters. Do you realize that four of the chapters deal with the first 30 years of the life of Jesus and 85 of them deal with the last three years? Now, you may have thought about that before, but you say, okay, well, Pastor David, what's the point?

The point is it was the last three years of his life that Jesus was really going forth in ministry and changing lives. So follow with me this, because, see, what happens is often we go, well, you know, I've gotten old, I've wasted a lot of time, a lot of stuff, a lot of water's flown under the bridge, but you know, I don't know if I can really make a difference. Oh, man, man, can you make a difference? Look what Jesus did in three short years. Now, I know we're not Jesus, but we have been empowered by Jesus, and you can change lives. It doesn't matter how much time you've wasted before now.

It doesn't matter. God will redeem those things. He'll even teach you things about that time that now you can use in ministry.

It's an amazing thing. So never think, well, I'm too old or I've wasted too much time or I've done this and I've done that. No, God wants to use you.

He wants to use you. Now, verse one of chapter 12 says, then six days before the Passover, Jesus came to Bethany, Lazarus, who had been dead, whom he had raised from the dead. There's an important detail in here.

We're probably not gonna get to it this week, but I want you to mentally make a note that we're given the date, well, not the date, but we're told that six days before the Passover. Let me tell you, you're never given something in Scripture that doesn't mean something. Every detail means something. As a young believer, I remember reading the genealogies and I'm like, okay, whatever. All this begat and stuff, it doesn't really, but as I've grown in the Lord, as I've matured, as I've studied the Scriptures, do you realize that in every one of those genealogies, there's something that's really, really cool when you dig and you bring it out?

In every one of them. So this detail, just kind of follow it away because we probably won't get to it this week, but we'll get to it next week and let me promise you, it will blow your mind the implications. So we're gonna come back to that. So now, here's Lazarus who was dead. That's just kind of cool to say, Lazarus who's dead, now he's sitting there and you know what? What an amazing thing.

Let me ask you a question. If you were writing a book to deceive people and you were just coming up with stuff, would you include this part? I mean, seriously, this is a guy, he was dead and now he's alive. You know, if I was trying to create this big hoax on people, I think I would leave that part out. Why, because it takes faith to believe that, doesn't it? So, and here we have an awesome book. This is 40 different authors, 66 different books, written over 1,500 years by people who were moved by the inspiration of God and there is not one mistake in here. There is not one contradiction in here.

Not one. I've studied the book, I've read it through several times. There's not one contradiction. Yeah, I know, people say that.

You hear people say that, don't you? Eh, it's filled with contradictions. Next time somebody says that to you, try to have a Bible with you and when they say, oh, you know, you can't trust a Bible, Bible's filled with contradictions. Hand them your Bible and say, well, show me one. Show me one. Because you know what, I've seen, now there's a few spaces in there where if you were just skimming through it, you could think there's an apparent contradiction, but there's real easy answers for those. And generally, people aren't aware of those four. They're just saying that why, because they don't want to deal with the condition of their heart and the lack of their relationship with the Lord. So when you hear somebody go, eh, it's just filled with contradictions, hand them your Bible and go, well, just show me one.

Show me one. Well, they're in there. And if they do ever point out something that stumbles you, send us an email, give us a phone call, we'll walk you through it and better equip you to witness to those folks. Now, remember that, six days before the Passover. Verse two, there they made him a supper and Martha served, but Lazarus was one of those who sat at the table with him.

Now, notice what they were doing. And again, the Bible is a supernatural book and yet, you know, it's filled with natural occurrences. And here, they were fellowship in hell. They were fellowshiping over food. Eating food, do you understand that's a blessing from God?

You know, I've thought before, you know, God could have set it up where when we breathed, we got the necessary nutrients that we needed or perhaps from drinking the water, but that's not what he did. He set up where we eat and we can actually enjoy food. Now, to me, that's an awesome thing. And so they're enjoying the fellowship with one another. I encourage you to do this. I encourage you to fellowship with one another. I encourage you to, and it so blesses my heart when I'm, and I know it might seem like a small thing, but when somebody, I'm talking to somebody and he goes, well, you know, we were over at so-and-so's for dinner last night, ah, cool. Well, we went to lunch with so-and-so. Oh, that's neat. Because you know what happens is people are coming together and they're fellowshiping.

And to me, that's a beautiful, beautiful thing. Now, perhaps you're sitting there this morning and go, well, ain't nobody invited me to nothing. Well, may I encourage you to invite someone else to lunch. Invite somebody else to dinner. Don't sit back and go, nobody's invited me to nothing.

You go start inviting people. And you know, the wonderful thing about food is you won't, you know, especially if you're inviting them into your house to cook for them, you won't get a lot of no's, praise the Lord. And see, that's what's supposed to be happening in the body of Christ. First Corinthians chapter 10 verse 31 says, therefore, whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. Isn't that an awesome thing? So that you can eat and fellowship with one another and be bringing God glory.

I mean, how cool is that? Verse three, then Mary took a pound of very costly oil of spikenard, anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped his feet with her hair. And the house was filled with the fragrance of the oil. Now, spikenard is, as it's pointed out here, it's very expensive. It was actually usually produced in India and then shipped to Israel in small containers. Sometimes people would, that would be their investment. They would invest into these ointments and salves and stuff and two other reasons why she may have had this are kind of intriguing. One of them is, it may have been her dowry for her husband. And in a moment of sacrifice, she poured it out on the Lord Jesus Christ. The other possibility is as intriguing, it may have been for her burial. And she decided instead of using it for her burial, she would pour it out on the Lord Jesus Christ. Anyway you came up with it, it's an incredible sacrifice. It's an incredible statement that Mary made in her worship of Jesus. It's an awesome thing. And you know what's interesting here?

Is you see a picture and here's a family. Man, these people have gotten a hold of Jesus, haven't they? Because look at Mary, Martha and Lazarus and what's going on in the picture here. Well, you know, first of all, you got Lazarus who, I mean, I've said it before, but I'll say it again. He was dead.

I mean, you know, as testimonies go, that's a really good one. You know, I was dead. I was in the tomb.

They had to call me out. And so he was given what? He was given new life.

He was given new life. That's where the Christian life starts. That's where it really begins. See, your relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ doesn't begin when you walk into a church.

I'm sorry, but that's not it. There's many people this morning that are all over churches that don't know Jesus, that don't have new life. It begins when you say to Jesus, Jesus, I'm a sinner, so I have sinned.

Please forgive me. And he does it and you're given new life. And it doesn't matter if you've been to church one time or you've been to church 200 times. This is where we start with a new life. And so you have Lazarus there that has the new life. And then you have Mary there who's worshiping. So you got new life and then you have worshiping. And Mary is worshiping. She's at the feet of Jesus.

She's sacrificially pouring this ointment out on him. That's worship. That is worship. Worship is an important part of the believer's life. That's why on Sunday morning, we spend time in worship. We want to linger in worship.

We want to take some time, 20 minutes, 25 minutes, sometimes 30 minutes to linger in worship. You know why? Because that is important.

That is important. And when somebody, when an unbeliever or maybe somebody that strayed from the Lord comes into a group of people that are really worshiping, oh man, there ain't nothing like that in the whole world. People come in and like, wow, these people are serious. They're not somber. They're not singing funeral dirges. They're actually happy about worshiping.

God, this is awesome. And so there we have Mary worshiping and then we have Martha. We've got new life, we've got worshiping, and what's Martha doing? Martha's serving.

Martha is serving. That's such a beautiful little picture of what we're supposed to be doing as believers. We're given new life so that we worship and so now we can serve. Now some people get these inverted.

Some people get them twisted. Some people begin to serve before they're given new life. I'm sorry, that's not really a good thing because here's what can happen. You can start to get confused. You can think, oh, God is interested in what I might do for him.

Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no. God is much more interested in what he has already done for you. And as we understand what God has done for us, the natural reaction is to worship him and to begin to serve.

And I think when you begin to understand what God has done for your life, that's just a natural thing. We'll be right back with more from David McGee on Cross the Bridge. Right now, here's a word from Associate Pastor D.A. Brown. Hey, Bob, I want to take a minute to pray for some listeners in the state of Idaho, specifically these cities.

Cascade, Clarkston, Grangeville, Ketchum, Marcing and Boise, McCall, and Moscow. God, we thank you for everyone listening today. Lord, we pray that you would encourage them and remind them how much you love them. Lord, if there is some listening today who haven't put their trust in you, we pray that today will be the day that they would say yes to allowing you to forgive them of their sins and that they would say yes to following you with all their heart, all their soul, and all their strength.

And, Lord, we pray that you would get them plugged into a Bible-teaching, Bible-believing church. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. Thank you, brother.

And now, let's get back to David McGee as he continues teaching verse by verse. This morning, maybe you want to think, okay, where am I on this scale? Am I sure that I have new life? I mean, do I know that I know that I know that I've been saved, that I've been born again? There were many people that even shared on the video testimony that would have said, yes, they were when they first came in. But then the more they heard, the more they listened, they said, you know what?

I don't have what he's talking about. I wonder how I get it. That's why at the end of every service, and we'll do it again today, we give people the opportunity to respond to the good news. And the good news is that Jesus Christ died for you so that you can be forgiven. And when you accept that forgiveness, you are cleansed from all unrighteousness. You're forgiven.

I want an amazing thing. Because from that moment on, God looks at you and sees a new person. God looks at you, and yeah, I know, once you pray that prayer, you don't quit messing up. And if your plan is to get to the place where you don't mess up anymore, and then you'll pray that prayer, there's a flaw in your plan, man. The flaw in your plan is you'll always mess up.

You'll always make some mistakes. What you need to do is respond to that tugging on your heart. Respond and pray the prayer.

Ask the Lord to forgive you, and ask Him to give you the power to follow Him, and watch Him change your life. Because from that moment on, understand, when God looks at you, He doesn't see a sinner anymore. He sees a saint. What? Yeah, I know, it's almost too good to be true. He sees a saint.

He sees somebody that's been washed white. That's an amazing, amazing thing. Do you deserve it?

No, I don't deserve it either. But God is willing to make that transaction with each and every person here. The question is, have you done this?

Have you done this? And as you receive new life of worshiping the Lord and serving, and again, the new life. This is what the Bible says. The born again thing is not something man came up with. It's something Jesus said in John 3. He said, except a man be born again, he can't see the kingdom of heaven. That's the reality of the scripture. That's what Romans 10, nine, and 10 says, that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart, one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth, confession is made unto salvation. And then Romans 10, 13, just a few verses later says, whosoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. Whosoever, what does that mean? It means anybody. Anybody who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. How awesome is that?

How awesome is that? So the new life, and this is really important. This is, you know, Christianity kind of 101, 201 stuff.

So I want to spend some time on this. The new life, that's how we're born again. That's what we all have to do. That's where we all started our life with the Lord, is in this new life. And because of that, we worship. Now, worship isn't necessarily music.

That may shock some of you. What do you mean it's not music? We use music as a vehicle of worship. It certainly helps to worship.

Worship, this is the first life lesson. Worship is an expression of thanks. Worship is an expression of thanks.

This is really important for us to understand. Now, it's interesting, you know, it seems like a lot of people are doing contemporary worship now. And of course, we're doing contemporary worship, but you know what, it's because to me, that's a real expression to the Lord. We didn't do a demographic study and think, well, you know, some people like contemporary worship, and you know, and that's not why we do it. It's a real expression of our thanks to God. And so when you come in, you know, and maybe you sit out there, I don't know what goes through your head, maybe, you know, you sit out there and you go, I hate electric guitars.

I don't know, or maybe this morning you say, I hate the banjo, I hate it. That doesn't really, that doesn't matter. And sometimes worship will be more upbeat, sometimes it'll be slow. We do try to combine the things. We try to give, you know, slower songs and faster songs to give everybody an opportunity to worship.

But you know what, it's not really about the music. It's an expression of thanks. It's an expression of thanks. And we don't worship God because we feel like it. That's not worship. See, there are mornings, there are mornings where I or other members of the team, they may not feel like worshiping, but they worship, you know why?

Because God is worthy to be worshiped. Whether I feel like it, they feel like it, or you feel like it. And let's go ahead and be real with one another. There will be mornings when you come in here, you won't feel like worshiping. And I see it in some of your faces, maybe you've been beat up, maybe you're tired. And so you come in here and you're like, oh, I don't know, I don't know if I'm gonna worship or not.

And you know, you're kind of holding back. But we worship again, not because we feel like it, but because He's worthy. And some mornings, I understand, you may have things that are going on that are breaking your heart and your life is filled with pain. There is no better time to worship than that. And because you come in here and you worship God, and at those times, I understand, again, it is a sacrifice of praise, literally. But how honoring to God, who is so deserving of our worship and our thanks. I wanna encourage you in that.

So you got new life, worshiping and serving. And only you can assess where you are. Make sure number one's there. Make sure number two is there.

And make sure that number three is there. See, we give you opportunities to serve here. You can get involved in so many different ways. There's so many different opportunities to serve here. And it's not like we give you some theological exam or even some IQ test or anything like that.

We just give you an opportunity to serve. So one other thing that you see is that they were doing this in the house. They were doing this in the house. See, here's what's happened to the average American. They've kind of separated what happens on Sunday morning and the rest of their life. I go to church on Sunday, I act like this, I look like this, I dress like this, and the rest of the week, I do whatever I want to. That's not real Christianity.

That's not following Jesus. See, and in this place, it was in the home. You see, that's yet another reason why we're encouraging people to get involved with fellowship groups.

We want to encourage people to go in one another's home, to get to know one another, and have these things start to occur in your daily life. One of the things I've always encouraged people to do is have communion at home. Now, if you were raised in a real strictly religious background, you're going, oh, that's wrong. You can't have communion at home. I mean, you don't have a priest or a pastor or a father or a bishop or nothing. You guys are deputized and authorized to go have communion at home, okay? Because let's remember, the first communion took place in a home. So when we have it in a church, that's a little different.

When you have it at home, that's where it's supposed to happen. So let me encourage you. You know, you get the matzah, you get the grape juice, and go have communion. It's an awesome time. I've had beautiful times of communion with my family.

I want to encourage you in that. So verse four. But one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, who would betray him, said, why was this fragrant oil not sold for 300 denarii and given to the poor?

That sounds good, doesn't it? That sounds noble, that sounds right, 300 denarii. The average wage at that time for a laborer is you got one denarii for a whole day's work. So 300 denarii is basically a year's salary for a laborer.

It was a lot. And doesn't this sound good and noble and religious? And, oh, look at Judas. Judas is actually getting something right here. He's standing up, he's wanting to take care of the poor.

Is he? Well, John makes a note that's not made in the other gospels or at least it's not brought out in this way. He says in verse six, this he said, not that he cared for the poor, but because he was a thief and had the money box. And he used to take what was put in it. Well, that kind of puts a different spin on the whole thing, doesn't it? See, sometimes you can hear somebody say something, you go, oh, that sounds good.

Well, that sounds religious, that sounds noble. But what's the motivation? What are they doing? What's behind the scenes, if you will? Here you're looking behind the scenes and then you find something that's not good, not good at all. When you kind of look at these two people who are interacting with Jesus, you look at Judas and you look at Mary.

And what do you see? Mary's a giver. Mary's a giver. Mary doesn't care how much that bottle costs. She's gonna pour it on Jesus.

Why? To love on Jesus. Judas is a taker.

Judas is going, wow, I could have ripped some of that money off had we sold that. The life lesson here is God is a giver. When we give, we are more like him.

Now, if you think I'm just talking about finances, I'm not letting you off that easy. I'm talking about giving your life away. I'm talking about serving and loving others, giving yourself away in ministry. Certainly includes finances because if we're grateful, we should become more like God in that we give.

John 3.16 says what? God's a love that he gave. God's a giver. So when we give, we're acting like God. When we just worry about taking, well, friend, we're acting like Judas. And let me ask you a question.

Who would you rather look like? Jesus or Judas? Jesus was a giver. Judas was a taker. Friend, do you know for sure that your sins have been forgiven?

You can know right now. I want to lead you in a short, simple prayer, simply telling God you're sorry and asking him to help you to live for him. Now, God wants you to pray this prayer so much that he died to give you the opportunity and the ability to ask him to forgive you.

Please pray this prayer with me out loud right now. Dear Jesus, I believe you died for me, that I could be forgiven. And I believe you were raised from the dead, that I could have a new life. And I've done wrong things. I have sinned, and I'm sorry. Please forgive me of all those things.

Please give me the power to live for you all of my days. In Jesus' name, amen. Friend, if you prayed that prayer, according to the Bible, you've been forgiven. You've been born again.

Jesus said he would not turn anybody away who comes to him, and he came for those people who knew they needed forgiveness, those who were sick, not the righteous. So congratulations, friend. You just made the greatest decision that you will ever make. God bless you. If you prayed that prayer with David for the first time, we'd love to hear from you. You can visit crossthebridge.com to receive our First Steps package with helpful resources to help you begin your walk with Christ.

Or you can write to Cross the Bridge at P.O. Box 12515, Winston-Salem, North Carolina, 27117, and share how God is working in your life. You know, the Bible tells us that the free gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord. But it does cost for us to come and bring that message to you and to others in your neighborhood, through radio, through the Internet, and through the mobile technologies that God has gifted us to be able to use. So if you'd like to support this ministry, please go to crossthebridge.com, click on the Donate button, and ask God how much he would have you give, either on a one-time basis or a continuing basis each month to help ensure that the teaching of God's word continues to go out through Cross the Bridge.

Thank you so much. Well, D.A., before we go, what are some ways that we can bless our listeners? Each day you can wake up with encouragement from Pastor David through the Word of God with his email devotional, life lessons to consider, a daily reading plan, and a thought to meditate on throughout your day from the heart of David McGee. Thanks again for listening, and join us next time as David McGee continues teaching verse by verse in the Gospel of John.